State Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, D-Teaneck, as the New Jersey Senate meets to debate the budget Thursday.

Democrats on Thursday expected Governor Christie to veto the tax increase on high-income earners when they sent it to his desk for a fourth time, but this time they’re using the measure to send a message to a judge that there is an alternative to slashing state pension contributions.

The Senate and Assembly, both controlled by Democrats, sent Christie a $34.1 billion budget with party-line votes. They also approved two tax hikes to support that budget, including the latest attempt to increase taxes on income over $1 million.

The votes came the day after a Superior Court judge ruled that Christie could reduce the state’s pension contribution for the fiscal year ending Monday, but only because the state faced a fiscal emergency — a $1 billion revenue shortfall with only weeks left in the fiscal year. But Judge Mary C. Jacobson said she was not endorsing Christie’s proposal to cut the payment for the coming budget year and hinted in her ruling that she could side against him if he slashes the pension contribution, something he can now do through a line-item veto.

Although Christie has vowed to veto the tax hikes, lawmakers spent hours debating the bills and the budget plan that uses the additional revenue to make a $2.25 billion pension payment. Christie had yet to take action as of late Thursday and a spokesman for the governor did not respond to requests for comment.

The pension issue is a political fault line between Democrats and Christie. Fighting for the $2.25 billion pension payment allows Senate President Stephen Sweeney to solidify his support with unions after years of compromising with Christie on issues including the legislation that required public employees to pay more for their pensions and health benefits. For Christie, who has said he plans to call for additional reforms by the end of the summer, opposing the pension payment and the tax increases allows him to continue fighting the unions while advocating for businesses as he considers running for president in 2016.

This year’s fight over the budget revolves largely around the annual state contribution into the nearly $80 billion fund that pays for pension benefits of about 769,000 active and retired employees. A 2010 law called for regularly increasing payments over a seven-year period, and a 2011 law required employees to contribute more, among other changes, and made those payments a contractual obligation.

Fourteen public employee unions sued Christie, a Republican, after he signed an executive order last month that slashed the payment for the fiscal year ending June 30 and proposed scaling back the payment for the coming fiscal year to $681 million. Christie said those payments cover all active employees who are paying into the system, but do not go toward the unfunded pension liability, which he blames on past governors who borrowed against the fund and skipped payments.

Sweeney, D-Gloucester, said the Superior Court judge had no choice this week but to rule that Christie could slash the payment for the current fiscal year because there is no time to come up with an alternative. But Sweeney said the budget cycle that begins July 1 is different because Christie has other options, among them raising additional revenue through new taxes.

“It’s sending a message to the courts that we can give a balanced budget that makes our obligations,” said Sweeney, who sponsored the tax bills. “That I think is very important to show. There are ways, it’s just he chooses not to.”

The governor said during an event Wednesday that he would reject the tax hikes and he’s expected to utilize the line-item veto on the budget bill to reduce spending on the pensions. The state constitution requires that a balanced budget be in place by July 1.

Republicans criticized the Democrats for sending Christie tax bills they know he will veto.

“We’ve ended up with a document that, let’s be honest, in mere hours will become irrelevant,” said Assembly Republican Budget Officer Declan O’Scanlon, R-Monmouth. “The answer to my friends on the other side of the aisle always seem to be higher taxes.”

And they argued that the tax hikes will only drive the state’s wealthiest residents — who contribute the largest share to the tax base — and businesses out of New Jersey.

“The evidence is crystal clear — if you tax them, they will leave,” said Assemblywoman Caroline Casagrande, R-Monmouth.

The unions are urging Christie to accept the Democrats’ budget proposal, but if he doesn’t, they’re prepared to go back to court and they think they will win this time.

“These are already earned benefits and the judge found that people had a contractual right to them and that not funding them was a contractual impairment,” said Hetty Rosenstein, state director of the Communication Workers of America. “So this governor cannot make this amount of money go away by just saying it: ‘I don’t want to pay it.’ ”

One of the bills would raise the tax on income exceeding $1 million to 10.75 percent for three years. Under current law the state’s highest tax rate is 8.97 percent levied on any income above $500,000. The other bill would increase the corporate business tax from 9 percent to 10.35 percent for one year. In addition to the tax hikes and increased pension payment the budget also shelved Christie’s plan to apply the state’s tobacco tax to electronic cigarettes and increased funding for a tax credit for low-wage workers.

Assemblyman Chris Brown, R-Burlington, questioned whether the corporate business tax surcharge would only be in place for a year.

“As a business owner, I don’t trust the state of New Jersey to keep a tax for one year,” he said.

Democrats argued that Christie left them with no choice when he put forward a $32.7 billion spending plan in May that did not include the $2.25 billion pension payment the governor and lawmakers originally agreed to make.

“We take no pleasure in additional new taxes,” said Assembly Budget Chairman Gary Schaer, D-Passaic. “We can no longer afford to kick the ball down the road.”

During debate in the Senate, Democrats stressed that the budget bill wasn’t simply ignoring the state’s obligation to public employees and their retirements even if prior governors and Legislatures had made that mistake.

“It is a budget that meets all of the obligations required of this Legislature,” said Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee Chairman Paul Sarlo, D-Wood-Ridge. “We are not walking away from the sins of the past.”

‘Flawed’ approach

But Sen. Joseph Kyrillos, R-Monmouth, said bringing in more revenue from millionaires is a flawed approach to meeting those obligations. The state gleans much of its income tax revenue from the wealthiest filers, and he predicted the tax hikes will force them to leave the state.

“It’s not the millionaires that I’m worried about,” Kyrillos said. “It’s all the other people who depend on their tax revenue.”